Judge will allow murder confession at trial

MARION — A county judge will allow a Marion woman's confession to be presented as evidence at her murder trial.

During an interview following her arrest, Jacqueline R. Miller, 52, confessed to police that she beat her 81-year-old neighbor, Howard Biederman, to death with a pair of vise grips on June 7 at his two-story Uncapher Avenue home.

She has been charged with murder and with possession of cocaine, a fifth-degree felony, in Marion County Common Pleas Court. She has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.

Caleb Carson III, Miller's court-appointed attorney, asked the court to keep her confession from being shown at trial, arguing that police coerced the confession out of her and ignored her request for an attorney during a four-hour interrogation following her arrest late on June 7.

But Judge Jim Slagle denied Carson's motion Tuesday after playing the entire recording of Miller's interrogation at a hearing last week.

Slagle found that Miller's confession was made voluntarily and that the police did not do anything coercive.

The judge pointed to statements by the officers, in which they only suggested the prosecutor's office would be lenient if Miller confessed, which does not rise to the level of coercion under the law.

Slagle found that the officers never made any specific promises to Miller about what she would be charged with if she talked, promises that possibly would have voided her confession.

Slagle also found that Miller never specifically asked for a lawyer or for the interview to stop.

"Since she did not clearly request an attorney, the officers were not required to stop the interview until an attorney was present," Slagle wrote in his ruling.

Miller is scheduled to go to trial on Oct. 17.

Miller is being held in the Morrow County Jail on a $500,000 cash or surety bond.